


The Wheel Weaves Weirdly: Wheel of Time AU Summaries

by Zorpisuttle



Category: Avatar: Legend of Korra, Wheel of Time - Robert Jordan
Genre: Accidental Marriage, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Role Reversal, Crack Crossover, Crack Pairing, Crossover Pairings, Distinguished Gay/Disaster Gay, Everything is the same but the Seanchan Blood are all selkies, F/F, F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Crack, Fluff and Humor, Lucky!Perrin Aybara, Mat Cauthon can see your dreams now (sorry), Minotaur Symbolism!Perrin, Mutual Pining, PERRIN HAS A GUN, SUMMARIES, Selkies, Slow Burn, Wolfman!Mat Cauthon
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-16
Updated: 2021-02-21
Packaged: 2021-03-18 23:14:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,037
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29497875
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zorpisuttle/pseuds/Zorpisuttle
Summary: Wheel of Time AU concepts that I haven't turned into full works (and don't plan to), but which have at least some sort of outline. Currently includes such incredibly cursed concepts as the Tuon/Kuvira high school anime AU, the Seanchan Selkie AU, and the ta'veren storyline swap AU.
Relationships: Fortuona Athaem Devi Paendrag/Kuvira, Mat Cauthon/Berelain Sur Paendrag, Mat Cauthon/Fortuona Athaem Devi Paendrag, Perrin Aybara/Fortuona Athaem Devi Paendrag, Valan Luca/Varrick
Comments: 4
Kudos: 2





	1. The Tuon/Kuvira High School Anime AU

**Author's Note:**

> I am very good at connecting things that should not be connected, so I asked people to send me a crackship and a story style or concept (such as "Lanfear/Machin Shin, teen rom-com") and I'd write them a little blurb explaining how it could possibly work. In response, anyboli sent me "Tuon/Kuvira, high school AU", and this happened.

So first off, this is clearly a Japanese high school anime- personally, I'm visualizing Ouran High School- and for some extremely silly reason the high school has combined executive power (Student Council President) and social power (Prom Queen) into a single position, "The Empress". (This was translated in early fansubs as "President Queen", and some fans still call the position that.) Naturally, Tuon and Kuvira both want this role.

They start out hating each other. According to Kuvira, Tuon's been queen bee of the school far too long, coasting on her mother's position on the school board. Plus, she's entitled, snobby, and keeps trying to poach Kuvira's entourage. (It's easier than it sounds, most of them don't like Kuvira that much, while Tuon's entourage is fiercely loyal.) Kuvira, on the other hand, clawed her way up the social hierarchy with effective leadership (Tuon: "I think you meant to say 'blackmail'?") and is widely popular with the student body as a whole.

We see in a flashback that earlier in their rivalry, Kuvira slammed Tuon up against a locker in a way that onlookers would later describe as 'suspiciously homoerotic'. After staring at her expressionlessly, Tuon simply broke Kuvira's arm to get out of the hold. Kuvira spent the next few weeks stomping around glaring equally at Tuon and her arm, muttering "It's useless now!" Tuon made her point and Kuvira isn't interested in beating up on someone who can fight back that hard, so now they just snub each other icily in the halls.

This status quo changes when someone starts spreading nasty rumors about Tuon. They are close enough to the truth that they're making Tuon really uncomfortable, and she's not sure how to handle it. Kuvira discreetly offers to do damage control, given her expertise with ~~blackmail~~ propaganda. Kuvira is doing this for blackmail material, so Tuon will owe her a favor, and to get in close and see how she works. Tuon is very surprised, but she accepts, partially because nothing she's doing is working and she's very practical- when your friends can't help, call on your enemies- and partially because she believes in keeping your friends close but your enemies closer.

As they work together, Kuvira becomes grudgingly impressed with Tuon's judgement and integrity (while noting that she still has blind spots, especially around her privileged background). Tuon is also grudgingly impressed with Kuvira; she thought Kuvira was a jumped-up social climber and bully with no real skills, but eventually realizes that Kuvira works hard and at least sometimes has good intentions (while still thinking she can be very heavy-handed).

This whole time they're also still competing for the Empress position- but they don't talk about that, for the most part, although Tuon does get a rather closer look at Kuvira's tactics than she normally would, since Kuvira is using some of them to save her reputation. Their meetings, which are still ostensibly about damage control, become less laser-focused on that and start being more social- they talk about shared interests, things they agree on re: school governance and event planning, and they're each trying to find out stuff about the other without revealing anything about themselves. They also start realizing they're attracted to the other; Tuon is the first to figure it out but she mostly just compartmentalizes it. It's a distraction from the matters at hand, and while she suspects Kuvira might also be into her, she isn't interested in pursuing it unless Kuvira brings it up. Kuvira, on the other hand, literally doesn't realize she's into Tuon until she has the opportunity to betray the actual details of Tuon's secret to Varrick and Valan Luca (who are the B-couple here, they fall head over heels in the background of the first episode and team up to run the school festival, with Valan Luca doing crowd work and organization, and Varrick running the books and coming up with ideas.) Kuvira chooses not to betray Tuon, and as she's kicking herself afterwards she realizes that all she could think about was how Tuon would look at her with absolute, icy disdain again and MEAN IT, not as a joke between them but in all seriousness, and she can't bear that, and OH FUCK SHE'S IN LOVE WITH TUON, WHAT IS WRONG WITH HER, UGH. Kuvira has no idea Tuon is into her too, and gets extremely weird and awkward and fidgety around Tuon the next time they meet. Tuon is suspicious and alarmed and thinking through all sorts of nightmare scenarios with her usual poker face, but all she says is "You're being weird. What happened?"

Kuvira says that Varrick and Valan Luca approached her about the rumor. She hastily adds, "I didn't confirm anything. I stuck to the plan." Tuon is sure she's lying, because she's clearly covering up _something_ , and while normally she'd have the stamina and patience to winkle out the truth, suddenly she's super angry and not thinking clearly. "You're lying. Once a blackmailer, always a blackmailer. I should have stuck with people I trusted." She gets up and leaves the room, slamming the door on the way out. Kuvira is devastated and also relieved, because at least things are familiar now. She doesn't tell Varrick and Valan Luca anything, though, and continues doing her end of the damage control- she tells herself that it's to prove she's better than Tuon, that she kept the faith even after Tuon gave up.

Their rivalry for Empress steps up again and continues at a fever pitch right up until the voting. The Empress election event is completely, unnecessarily formal, in a way that makes you extremely confused about how this is all being run by a high school, and the candidates are brought up on stage to hear the winner declared. Tuon narrowly wins the contest, and before she can accept the crown, while the ceremonial music is playing (it's _Empire_ , by Alpines), Kuvira leans over and whispers "Congratulations. You earned it," entirely sincerely. Tuon stares at her and sees that she actually means it. Heartened, Kuvira adds, "I didn't tell Varrik and Valan Luca, because-" and the rest comes out in a rush, "I love you." Tuon's eyes go very big and she looks like she's about to say something, but then the music ends and the crown is presented to her- it's made of a bunch of small pieces, woven and linked together. Tuon eyes it and then presents it to Kuvira, pointing at specific points in the middle. "You're stronger than me- can you bend those two metal links apart a little?" Kuvira, extremely confused, nonetheless does what she's asked. Tuon takes the loosened links and separates the crown into two pieces. After crowning herself (because of course she would) she turns to Kuvira and gestures at her impatiently to bend her head a little. (Tuon is only 4'11" and she literally can't reach the top of Kuvira's head without help...) Kuvira catches on and allows herself to be crowned. While Kuvira is still bent down towards her, Tuon kisses her in front of God and everybody. Kuvira kisses her back. Rose petals fall from the sky for unexplained reasons.

Their reign is long, glorious, and actually pretty irrelevant because Varrick and Valan Luca are the school's _actual_ power couple, but that won't become completely apparent until later seasons.


	2. The Seanchan Selkie AU

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Wheel of Time, but if the Seanchan Blood were all selkies. That's it, that's the concept.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I woke up at 4 am with the thought "What if Tuon was a selkie and Mat accidentally married her by taking her sealskin?"

Everything is the same except the Seanchan Blood are all selkies. They have seal-fur coats that when worn can transform them into seals. If someone who is not the selkie takes their coat, the coat-thief is automatically married to the selkie. Whether this means that Luthair Pendragon and his companions were selkies, or that at least one kingdom in Seanchan was just chockablock full of selkies, is left as an exercise for the reader. (But my money's on the latter.)

So, naturally, in this AU Mat accidentally grabs Tuon's sealskin coat while kidnapping her, and Egeanin walks in and is like "OH SHIT, fyi you're married now". After they get out of Ebou Dar, Mat gives it back, and Tuon takes it, but keeps travelling with him, and Egeanin is like 'you're delusional, I don't know why she hasn't run away yet but she's definitely not going to give you her sealskin back now that she has it.' Eventually, when Tuon's satisfied that Mat is the person in the prophecy, she presents him with her coat and she's like, "You're in charge of this now. You have a lot of accessories and you actually do take decent care of them, so I expect you to treat this like one of your own."

The Seanchan twist on the selkie story is that another selkie can either strip them of their selkiehood by revoking their right to their coat- thus kicking them out of the Blood- or bestow selkiehood upon someone by giving them a sealskin coat, thus adding them to the ranks of the Blood. Either ceremony involves giving them a new name, and the name change in addition to the coat transfer is what makes it different from a marriage. A marriage could bestow a title as well as custodianship of the coat, but not a new name or official selkiehood.

Under these rules, Mat did not become a selkie until Fortuona named him Knotai (and presumably gave him a coat from a now-dead or demoted Blood member- could have been Egeanin's, or a High Blood traitor's, or maybe they have a stack of heirlooms for just these sorts of occasions.) And while Mat is now officially a selkie, he refuses to transform into a seal on principle. Tuon's got his selkie coat anyway, he awkwardly shoved it at her as soon as they were alone, saying "I've got yours, so you might as well hang on to mine for me." She keeps it folded up with the little silk rosebuds.


	3. Perrin's Cursed Shadar Logoth Ax AU aka PERRIN GETS A GUN

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> WoT AU where Perrin is the dumbass who keeps a shiny cursed ax from Shadar Logoth, while Mat drops the dagger before leaving Shadar Logoth and ends up getting wolf powers instead, so they get each other's powers and story paths, but keep their original personalities.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shout-out to Adurna, johmega, and Pexitron on the Randland discord for contributing enthusiasm, questions, and ideas to this nonsense.
> 
> What's really interesting about this is how much it highlights that the individual ta'veren struggles are actually at root the same; all of the boys struggle to accept both the responsibilities and the violence that the narrative pushes on them.
> 
> However, the boys don't struggle with the same issues to the same degree! So if you give responsibility-avoidant Mat the plotline that incentivizes responsibility, and violence-repulsed Perrin the plotline that incentivizes violence, they hit their growth points quicker and get over their internal conflicts faster. XD

Concept: WoT AU where Perrin is the dumbass who keeps a shiny cursed ax from Shadar Logoth, while Mat drops the dagger before leaving Shadar Logoth and ends up getting wolf powers instead, so they get each other's powers and story paths. Their personalities are the same.

**Mat’s Path: Beloved Culture Hero With Daydreaming Superpowers**

In the original universe Mat's internal struggle is to come to terms with responsibility (with his spelled-out fate as catalyst), and his external struggle is about leading battles and revolutionizing warfare. In the AU, he'd be put in a position of responsibility after saving everybody and he'd behave better because he was being appreciated and trusted, and the only struggle would be to stop him from using the Wolf Dream for literally everything, including battles somehow. 

I think Mat would likely be kind of uneasy about the wolf powers at first, but he'd LOVE Tel'aran'rhiod, he's always daydreaming, and that's a place where your daydreams become real. He'd test out all of his fun wolf powers and Dreamwalking abilities immediately. Hopper would still be exasperated but for completely different reasons. His wolf name is probably something like "Young Fox" or "Young Coyote". Mat would also go back and rescue Emond's Field from Trollocs and Whitecloaks and turn it into a trading empire. At some point when Perrin returns from Rhuidean, Mat would go on a special mission to steal Perrin's hat, because frankly Perrin wouldn't keep wearing it after leaving the Waste anyway, and it looks better on Mat. This is my only concession to the original storyline’s aesthetics.

Unlike Perrin, Mat would not hesitate to rescue people from Masema, and he'd be good at the political stuff. He'd love being viewed as a hero, though he'd possibly have some of the same struggles Perrin did re: taking on leadership, because it implies responsibility. But with Mat, it's more that he'd pitch in during a crisis automatically and then bitch about it after, and I think after people started giving him positive attention for helping them, he'd act out and complain less.

He and Faile wouldn't be into each other but they'd be bros (a little like him and Birgitte in the original universe) and have a good working relationship; Faile would be his work wife (but not his actual wife) in his role as Lord of the Two Rivers. Also, the really great news about this universe is that Faile and Berelain can be friends because they're not fighting over Perrin, or Mat, since Faile isn't interested in Mat and at first Berelain isn't either. Mat's love interest in this situation is Berelain, but it's a very slow burn. (I can’t imagine anything but a slow burn/mutual pining romance for Mat, he’s just built for it.) 

He'd be freaked out about Berelain at first (due to getting the Min advice about running from the most beautiful woman you've ever seen) but on the other hand I can see him going 'wait, hang on, I do not take advice' and he'd try to flirt with Berelain and get shut down, hard. Mat respects a rejection, so instead they slowly become friends. Once Mat gets to know her, he starts falling for her, but doesn't actually realize he's in love until Berelain gets kidnapped by the Shaido, which adds extra complicated stakes to the situation. He resolves not to mention it, because she's made it clear she's not interested. Berelain has also slowly fallen for him, but thinks Mat isn't interested anymore since he's treating her in a normal, professional way, and is also kind of embarrassed to go back on her earlier rejection. There is delicious, delicious Mutual Pining that neither of them pick up on. Fortunately for Mat, Berelain has a lot of time to think once she's kidnapped, and when he rescues her and she sees how intense and freaked out he was about her, she realizes that he is in fact into her and she will proposition him. (This is my second favorite part of the AU, as Perrin actually has the best part.) Also, Mat would absolutely kick Lanfear's ass in Tel'aran'rhiod, with or without the power of love.

**Perrin’s Path: Luckily, I’m Very Qualified For This Job**

Ok, so on to Perrin. In the original universe, Perrin's internal struggle is to come to terms with his capacity for violence (with his wolfman destiny as catalyst), and his external struggle is about taking on political and social responsibility. In the AU, Perrin would now have actual stakes for the hammer vs ax issue, so it would get resolved sooner. Also, Perrin's issues with responsibility aren't 'I don't want to work hard', they're 'I'm not the right man for the job'. Once Perrin has the thought "The Pattern has specifically prepared me to be really good at killing people, that's my job now", he'd just go do his job.

Again, I like to think that Perrin still has the hammer vs ax dilemma, but now has rather different stakes, and Perrin might be a lot more concerned than Mat ever was about the lingering darkness in his soul. I think that's what prompts him to go through the stone doorway in the Stone of Tear, in this universe. Unlike Mat, he knew specifically what he was going to ask for in the Rhuidean doorway, so he asks for them directly (I haven't quite worked out what his accessories would be in this universe, but I bet one of them is a hammer. Maybe the ashandarai becomes a war hammer?)

His big internal bugaboo is whether all of his new battle memories make him a bad person and whether he’s tainted forever by the ax, so he spends way more time than Mat ever did feeling bad about being really good at war. However, once he decides, 'Well, I'm working for the light, this is clearly my job now, and I have the tools for it, so I should do my job and take pride in my work," he's fine.

I also think that, being a blacksmith, he would be more familiar than Mat is with metalworking and would invent cannon way earlier. He would invent cannon so early that I also think he would have time to invent guns. That's right, in this universe, Perrin has a gun. He probably forges a gun with the One Power. Also, Perrin is going to be absolutely magnificent in his final visit to *Finnland, because in this universe, _Perrin_ is the bull-headed monster lurking in the center of the labyrinth. The *Finn know how to handle your average trickster fox, but they are not prepared for Minotaur!Perrin. Perrin would get out of there way faster than Mat and with all of his body parts, because a) Perrin would absolutely bring guns to fairyland, b) Perrin doesn't give a shit about the delicate rules of fae bargains and c) Perrin would have obsessed over the puzzle of the gift he didn't specifically ask for, and would have known before he entered *Finnland what it was for, so once he found Moiraine he'd be able to escape immediately. This is Perrin's crowning moment and my favorite part of this AU.

Perrin and Tuon get married somehow, by the way- Tuon's prophecy and the Prophecies of the Dragon refer to him as 'the bull that makes the ravens fly'- but there's no love there and by the end of the series they're both fully intending to kill each other. (Tuon can read him like a book, and therefore doesn't trust him and is pretty sure he's going to be a huge threat to her rule; she doesn't flirt with him by threatening to kill him, because when Tuon wants you dead, you are just dead, she doesn't telegraph her intentions.) For his part, Perrin feels bad about having to kill his wife, but the Seanchan are evil and there's no way in hell Perrin's leading their armies after all this is over, so she's gotta die. Perrin might manage it first, since Tuon would wait till after the Last Battle, but then Selucia or literally any other Seanchan party would immediately kill Perrin. So. Hopefully everybody stays their hand till after the Last Battle, because otherwise the Light might have some major issues.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here's a bonus Perrin-themed AU that I refuse to elaborate on further because I assume it'd just be Teen Wolf: 
> 
> "Wheel of Time Modern AU where there's no channeling but Perrin is an actual werewolf."


End file.
